for the April 1st meeting of the Conservation Commission we'll stand and salute the flag please Al to the flag of the United States of America to the repblic for it stands one nation under God indivisible
with liy Justice for All okay well Mr chairman if I may quickly we have kind of a short agenda as I mentioned to you before we got here so the Thomas Hannon uh meeting scheduled fourth on our agenda is
requested to be continued by the representative to 429 okay so we need a motion for that so we have Thomas Hanah notice of attent 143 Cher reban SC 82 788 construct
accessory dwelling unit over garage and septic upgrade in the riverfront need to continue that 429 need a motion I'll make a motion to continue you have a second second all in favor oppose okay that's unanimous how about the assm they continuing too correct I'll just get that ear Mr chairman yes the ass
sermones have also requested to be continue to 429 all right J no from 10 zero River Road construct single family dwelling with driveway grading and other improvements in the buffer zone and boarding vegetative wet line need a uh motion to continue to 429 motion to continue thank you you may want to
specify the year on that one do you have a second a second thank you all in favor oppos that's unanimously on next we have Town Westport Highway Department notice int 10 Division Road replace existing failed Culver cut and Patch to Pavement good evening Mr leech good evening GRE
[Music] cards good evening to Westport highway department for replacing cul on Vision Road this culbert is located approximately 1 and2 M south of SL Corner Road or 2 and a half miles south of hicks Bridge Road on
a really bad curve you go down Vision Road it's a really bad n curve uh there's Wetlands on either side there's a currently 18in metal Calver that uh has been damaged and it's collapsing and road is kind of caving in if you go down there you'll see this there's a big
scallop in this pavement right here uh all we're doing is we're placing the one 18in with a 2 18in cul in the same location of course patching and Paving the roadway uh standard Sil fencing around work area so it can be done uh shouldn't take very long should take
about half a day hopefully depending on what's underneath the road we're not quite sure but it's an equalization Culver there basically significant Wetland on either side of this particular C and there's some water in there now for obvious reasons but it's a pretty simple project I don't to
anything complicated about thank you Sean Chris thank you Mr chairman would you like mine Chris thank we will be going we we do have a file number and we will be going to Dartmouth con meeting is next Wednesday the 8 uh
so we'll be going there next week for just ruined it why don't you just cut our half of the road and put our C in and leave that half collapse it's pretty complicated because yeah there's people on each side of the road I mean it's Wetland so we have to file with both to
I was kidding go ahead CHR just for the record this is a road that we do share Mr chairman but if you notice where the Town Line is it's actually on the opposing side on the um west side of the road so we share this road and I believe this is one the town maintains in flow
right yeah the town maintains everything south of uh old County so the road is all in their property no it's it's actually the the Town Line is the center of the road or least when it was was established in 1799 whever the road was at that particular time but there are
Stone bounds going all the way up the road so we just split it 20 ft on each side all right Mr chairman and members this is the town of West port and I also include the town of Dartmouth Division Road this is a noticeable intent application filed by Northeast engineers
and Consultants with Shan leech representing the date of the report is March 28th 2025 there is a file number with no adverse comment it's SE 82791 again agencies to be contacted would also be the town of dmouth site
visit was on March 27th 2025 I did give some more detailed photos of the location and its condition uh the town has filed to repair the undermined uh Road and replace the existing 18-in corrugated metal pipe Culvert with two
18in HTP pipes the road has become undermined from water flowing over the top of the road during Heavy Rain events the activity would be within the edge of the existing Wetland on the Westport side of the project the flow is associated with an intimate stream that conveys water from one bvw to the other
in darkness the work is being completed from the town the work is being completed after the town of doou conservation accepts the proposed design measures should be taken to complete the project during summer when the stream is dry minor impacts will occur during the
repair to the existing BBW edges erosion control shall be installed and remain until all areas are stabilized the repair can't meet stream Crossing standards uh in my opinion and I also don't think it applies but without building and raising the entire roadway
so we have very limited cover right now this road coverage is uh to allow for a box over would require the road to be dismantled and raised considerably so right now these two 18in pipes are only going to have a foot and a half of coverage over the top of them so any
more repair to that Beyond those limits um would cause you know much more expense to the community so Sean has discussed this with Dartmouth as he briefly mentioned and I think they were leaning towards uh drainage calculations um but Mark uh Garrett the
uh agent in Dartmouth was in agreeance that stream Crossing standards uh he did not believe were applicable as well so we're kind of working in the same idea um so this I'm saving about 50 square ft of BBW will be altered during the
erection of this pipe and stockpiling materials some temporary in nature not all entirely to be altered recommendations the Westport conservation should approve the 2 18in hdp pipes for Road repair contingent on
the adou conservations acceptance and special conditions of approval work uh should be done during the dry season I believe that stone rip wrap aprons you should include here Sean uh with heavy Stone 6 to 10 in stone should be placed
in the inlet and the outlets and erosion control should remain until all areas is stabilized okay fine any questions not a motion I me is that is that going to be rugged enough for like a you know dump truck to go
over without it just crushing it again it's got It's got 2T of c and it only requires a foot for the HTP heavy pipe corrugated pipe so it has enough cover it shouldn't be a problem and load I don't know what's underneath there now I to tried to take a look at it it looks like they somebody put a metal pipe and
then tried to put Stone in concrete head walls on the end or something I'm not sure what maybe you can put a bascule bridge there yeah it was tough when all the salon were going through there to get figure out what was going on the town in its repair days were famous for sleeving something into an old pipe
whether it corrugated they tried to stove something as far as they could because that corrugated area rots out and it causes undermining so a lot of these it looks like it's an H uh CMP and then you pull it out and it's an Old Stone cover that's been sliced through
so so there's no fish passage to speak of absolutely not this is an equalizer relative to one side flooding Bing across well you're replacing one 18in pipe with two 18in pipes correct yes
we're trying to increase better yes cuz we do have that over topping that's occurring not only because the CO's failed but I think that this needs a little more um relief and allowance for resiliency and seeing we do see
increased rain events this will be helpful all right we have a motion Mo approve second all in favor oppos that's unanimous should be C by open [Music] see
okay that concludes the uh hearing portion for the evening you bills and Bs here we have CHR oh [Music] jeez toldot of Miles yeah February
March stre months man what's that moan son Mohan son is that is Mohan Lane goingt Vermont moan Lane fromont all right we have Chris mileage is very detailed PR home of every
address he's visited at the federal rate of 70 cents a mile uh the total is $563 I need a motion to approve to pay Mr Capone for the last two months worth of mileage to approve my second all in
favor oppos all right next we have Eastbay media $61.50 which is for advertising for uh the the hearing tonight we have motion to pay motion to pay second second all in favor okay
that's approved we have March 4th minutes and that's not going to happen 17 minutes and see no okay so we can't approve any minut
we're missing some people some key people so that's it for my part of the uh evening's events Chris do you have anything for us no Mr chairman Val I wouldn't spend too much time fixing the camera well no one has anything else i' like to discuss I'd like to you have
anything you want to say no I'm all set this thank you any any PLS around actually they are back um they have made an appearance the end of last week the state has already I guess finished most of their work on the beach and done a good job it's just matter what there'll
be a storm there but they do have it all roped off but not the main portion of the beach so hopefully they're getting them to to nest in areas they're not already erecting the things up yet are they the yes along the entire access road and along DCR they are they were
out there uh last week why why did they do that now before they were actually even they they just that's what they do cuz the pl is unaware of defensing in other words so why don't you wait till they EST and then you they they they put
a sign a PL Nest Hawks stay away so they arbitrarily put the fence up not really knowing where the bird they normally the entire access road now both sides is are basically roped off um
then the access at the end of Bridge Road to the beach both sides of that is are now roped off but they did the major of the dunes and then I guess they're going to wait and see what happens on the Main Beach cuz I think my understanding is that there there was some a little bit of push back with how much they roped off last year at the
main Beach like you go down there and there is no act no place to sit um on horse neck so and also for the record the state went mandatory no dogs so any DCR property you cannot have dogs during these month the summer
months Statewide Statewide they were always I mean this the state was always pretty no what they're very I mean last year I think they had a blinking sign and stuff like that but now they just passed it it's in the it's I think in their rules now but the problem you're
going to have is that well we're having a discussion with the Autobon we're doing this beach management plans and one of the biggest pet peeves of the Autobon is the activities on Cherry web early in the morning which is Unleashed dog so yes I
think you're going to see something come to us having to enforce this with the management plans we're trying to establish how we tick it and enforce it it may be but again there already is a rule that they're supposed to be leashed how do you the dog do you have to have
their IDE uh the driver's license I'm not sure how they ticket you with respect to that it's a good question but I know they take the door they don't have aing thumbs to drive a steering wheel but maybe they can use like a PO adaptive type setup like a PO adaptive the environmental police were
tough last year in the state though they were they were going yes I'd like to see him come just during the months where it's crucial because a lot of people I understand exercising your animals but there's also I mean at the end of the day if they were all leashed it probably
wouldn't be a horrible situation the dogs allow with leash on the beach no you not on Horseneck on the town you need leashes yeah they required to be leashed but now horse neck says no dogs I always have a leash of my dog I don't go down the door for them too much sand
down Beach well everyone has the leash but it's in their hand because they let the dog they let the dog have his have they ever have they ever you know assessed whether like the Unleashed or leash dog POS more of a threat than like a they go by theot they go by the
footprint well they do go by the footprints but yes you're right the predatory animals at night are probably very significant and there's been some curtailing of those actions by the state trying to you know sniper some of these
predatory cuz it's monkey so this Mother's teaching the young so they're trying to you know disrupt that because as you know with deer the same thing the young ones are following mom and they're not going far from people's yards so I think you're seeing that when some
predatory animals staying close to where they learned something they inherited I think just by observing down there I think the Unleashed dogs are the problem because they have a tendency to chase clovers right when they're Unleashed as if you know it's natural dogs desire to
correct now I think the biggest issue is when you have fledgeling piping clovers running around and they can't fly can't that's that's where your problem lies but also gestation on the nest you disrupt the nest and maybe that could be predated at that moment
correct doesn't everybody like pretty much attachs the the plug Nest right the seagulls and everything everything can correct crows especially crows um coyotes um what else Fox as well down there oh
yeah Dunes it's the highway I have a a trail cam set up back there and there was a big big one back behind Bakers big pyot fair amount of fox went yeah well I the to would hire hunters
for the uh the dunes the state was doing that a few years ago that's what I was mentioning the state did at night with a few shop Shooters I don't know how successful it was not entirely sure that's safe but they're still having predatory issues even last year they had extremely a lot of they're all predated
they're almost all predated they all predated so the only successful Nest we have in Westport is Baker's Beach and in full disclosure we use an exclosure which they don't use that's true what that
mean we put a wire fence around the actual Nest there's those within the community that think that that's attracts predator but if they can't yeah it keeps them out and but they sit and wait they claim that they sit there and wait and go okay
Mom matter if they have a nest with like with with posts and orange tape on it that say coyotes don't come in they don't go past the tape yeah no our ours is feny so I know that's what I'm saying but if you don't put a fence up I mean what's just exactly they got to smell them and they're got to go get them yeah so the state is not doing those types of
measures right they just corre stringing fencing which the coyotes usess all or dogs or dogs yes but again when we only have usually one nest in the parking lot and jokingly it's like it's got 24-hour protection down there from us I mean
it's easy for you to but monitor 1520 Nest I think it's a little bit cumbersome to have those enclosures but I'm sure they does the town have a monitor they have mass AUD yes need to get out to run around and get something to eat are you fencing in
the birds no they have they can access it wi enough where they can access get in know um the state has their own DCR monitors I don't think they're contract they through the state yes there's usually about 8 to 10 of them down there we have Lloyd Center then Aon is
at the town but Jamie who's our Lloyd Center guy had worked with a lot of people at the state anyway so usually yeah they work hand inand pretty much together at least on documenting and following up on success how about down at the beach
ja we've had a couple um attempts of nesting and failed attempts a couple of the nest were predated or something happened but usually these blowout times a year two creates habitat that the plover's legs when we have these
overwash so they may like be Jaa this year it's got a little bit of that happening so it all depends on where they or rather where she selects her nest after he goes about making six to eight of them yeah in a
parking lot they do a lot of scraping and you just see all little scrapes and then they decide on one of them eventually for us it's that Paul buget sits here and picks all that sand out to make a depression eight times and imagine how many pieces of sand that is with no cover at all right there no no no it's their camouflage figure that out
it's tough to it really is difficult when she sits there yeah too yeah they definitely blend in with that salt and pepper look to them they anywhere else along Atlantic a around there different beaches Atlantic a is loaded too at elephant rock and
Westerly of there along Richmond Pond is pretty successful too they've learned to Nest higher up in the area there cuz a couple of years we had very spring tides and they were getting washed out so that happened I think last year or the year before so
seems the plovers of getting closer to the Dune line than they were before that's it all right good discussion Chris I'm glad we had it I think it's good for people to be aware of what's going on so thank
you what else that's the only other thing is the amount of burlap that is continuing to wash up on the beach is absolutely appalling it is still coming our dumpster is now full of burlap from that dredging just just so it's on record it's ridiculous that was part of
the contract wind blow Washington no not yet but we have a fair enough enough Burlap to do a potato sack race for all you can use the Burlap to pick up the plastic oh yeah it's funny you make little gloves for everybody the burlap is keeps coming
in yes I have not I haven't been to hor neck to see it there somebody told me oh that's what that was from from the dredging I said yeah it was like oh we thought a fishing boat took out all the all that carpet from their like house just threw it off are they are they like
like potato sacks or no so what it was a roll of burlap laying the bottom of the scull yeah every time they dumped the sand they had to relay burlap cuz it had a it had a opening that was letting the sand on every time they dumped into the
ocean in front of horse neck they dumped burlap every single trip it's been washing up the bur was on the bottom they put the stand on top of the bur and then dumped dumped but what was the purp purp of not why they have to put bur up in the first place they had a leaky scow it didn't have a good joint at the
bottom oh so they had an appropriate boat that it would need the burlock yeah it was a gap there we again I don't think the town was aware of it until it all started washing the shore but when they saw their loading area they realized that they had they
had pallets of burlap there that wasn't a local Scout was it no I don't think Louisiana guys I think that came up so they couldn't put like you know a cables on one side of it so and it dumped it went out the b laaper just hanging they can pull it back up I was told from him it was part of a
federal contract and the state approves that F they don't care about that I'm not sure again I think it was the last minute thing when they made we started using it and realizing that it was you know obviously going out the bottom scene bet if the water was Walmart maybe
it would that's that's all biodegradable it's all natural maybe it would have broken down but not in the middle of the winter no no it's kind of balling up in the sand you don't even know it's there until you kind of get uncovered by The Tide The Tide pulls it back out then it's exposed going to try to rip it out
in the morning people complain this trash in the beach water toy to get out with the tractor it's yeah yeah buries itself has it has it helped horse neck or the town beach replenish at all this sand I would say has quickly made it
back to the beaches has it I'm not sure I haven't been to horse neck to say but I was told there's a fair amount of sand but it's good their issue is between the high tide and entering the ocean it's still a lot of lot of rock they did save
a fair amount of sand on the beach portion but getting to that ocean is is a problem I don't know how they without breaking an ankle um yeah I mean my guess is it's you know it's going to move right back to where it came from I mean they only dumped it what 750 ft off
a horse NE not far enough in opinion no especially if we saw burlap at the mouth of the river already that means that's heavier than the sand so it's already going back where it came from so have you seen the channel markers that are all off station I did not I haven't done
that I came in I came in today and um there's red nuns that are a quarter of a mile off station like right in the surf right where you don't want to be if you see you know there you'll see like Chann marker Chann marker channel marker
channel marker so you know it's way off along thees on the main channel into the river coming from like you know 2 Mile rock but then there's it's kind of weird there's a number green odd number five from the Coast Guard you know big one
and then a small plastic one 15a so the numbers aren't even sequence and they're Tangled there's a there two Reds that are Tangled and two greens that are Tangled and they're way off station where they don't even belong yeah they usually come in this time of year
the Coast Guard and and reset yeah but I don't know whether why the five and the 15 they should be and number five is outside the river and 15 is way way in the numbers get higher inside I'm Rec well I am I can't well hopefully they figure that
out soon yeah you wouldn't want to come in here like not get familiar with the place You' have no idea what you're looking at the numbers are out of sequence they they don't not where they belong you coming you lster I brought I brought I thought today I brought my friend Lobster Bo over with
Bruce all right motion tojin motion toj second all favor POS that's on thank you Valerie